Teachers Stage Social Distance Sick Out - LA Progressive

Teachers Stage Social Distance Sick Out - LA Progressive

Teachers Stage Social Distance Sick Out

Today 915 of the 1,000 union educators in Brookline, Massachusetts, took part in a sickout demanding a six-foot distance between people in classrooms.

The district previously agreed to this safety requirement in a memorandum of understanding. But now it wants to allow the superintendent to change it.

“When they tried to give the superintendent unilateral control to change the distance, they tore up the MOU,” said Brookline Educators Union President Jessica Wender-Shubow.

She and the union vice president have already been served with papers for supporting the sickout. Strikes by public sector workers are illegal in Massachusetts.

Educators were already unhappy with the district for “faking it” on safety and rushing a return to buildings, Wender-Shubow said. “We started by telling the truth, exposing the lack of compliance everywhere.”

As some schools reopened on hybrid models, educators wrote down every example of non-compliance with safety measures, and sent more than 100 letters to the school committee (equivalent to a school board). Some educators read their letters aloud at a school committee meeting.

Ninth-Grade Teachers Led

One building in particular organized and led the way. In mid-October, educators who work with ninth-grade students, who are in their own building, were suddenly given an earlier date to return to in-person learning under the hybrid model.

Educators were already unhappy with the district for “faking it” on safety and rushing a return to buildings, Wender-Shubow said.

Members in that building started a petition campaign, demanding a one-week delay in the hybrid start date. They got more than 90 percent of members to sign before presenting the petition to the school committee. They won the delay.

But then the district announced that the hybrid model for ninth-graders, which has half of the students face to face Monday-Tuesday and the other half face to CONTINUE READING: Teachers Stage Social Distance Sick Out - LA Progressive

Houston ISD teachers hold 'sick out' to protest COVID-19 protocols

Houston ISD teachers hold 'sick out' to protest COVID-19 protocols

Houston ISD teachers hold 'sick out' to protest COVID-19 protocols

Houston teachers aren't pleased with the conditions they're expected to teach in amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and they staged a "sick-out" protest Thursday to demand a safer environment for themselves and their students.

Houston Public Media's Laura Isensee reported that teachers from at least a dozen schools participated in the protest, demanding no more than 15 students per class with six feet of social distancing required; meals be served outside or in well-ventilated areas; improved HVAC and air circulation for all classrooms; and mask policies be added to the student and staff code of conduct.

The planned sick-out happened on the same day that 16 Houston Independent School District schools reopened after being temporarily closed due to positive or presumed cases of COVID-19 on campus. The district said the schools have since been thoroughly cleaned and disinfected.

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Traci Latson, who teaches at Meyerland Performing and Visual Arts Middle School, addressed the reopening to Isensee, saying teachers really aren't sure if they have COVID-19 or not. Instead, they're openly "going into the building on a wish and a prayer that we are negative," she said.

“That’s simply frightening to me,” said Latson, as reported by Isensee. “Elementary, the students are pretty confined to one classroom. But when you’re on a secondary level, that’s a lot of exposure to a lot of students and educators in a building, so that’s frightening.” CONTINUE READING: Houston ISD teachers hold 'sick out' to protest COVID-19 protocols